Where to find ube-flavored treats on Long Island

Amy Espinoza studied the swirl of purple soft serve she'd been eager to try ever since spotting it on Instagram — not in some New York City hot spot, but practically in her backyard at Robin’s Creamery in Lynbrook.

“It’s hard to describe,” Espinoza, 38, of Lawrence said of the taste. “I feel it’s earthy.”

At Robin’s Creamery, the staff said it inspires instant devotion. During the February blizzard that dumped as much as 31 inches on Long Island, customers still packed the shop for a taste.

“They said ‘I gotta meet my craving,’ ” recalled manager Toushita Feona, 18. “And they came from the city. I was like, ‘Wow, the dedication.’ ”

The ingredient drawing them is ube, a purple yam central to Philippine cuisine that has recently surged in popularity across the country and here on Long Island. Known for its violet hue and a taste that some say is a combination of nutty and vanilla flavors, ube yams flourish in humid climates.

Like matcha a few years ago, ube has been all over social media and popping up at major U.S. food retailers. Starbucks now sells lattes, espresso shakes and even espresso martinis with light purple ube cold foam or cream topping the drinks. Costco has stocked products such as pancake mix and iced milk bars. And Dunkin' debuted a marshmallow ube swirl in 2024 for its Halloween Potion Macchiato.

When Bel Pagdanganan learned King’s Hawaiian Ube Coconut Rolls were available this month for a limited run, she immediately bought some at Target. Then she told her friends.

“Oh my God, it’s unbelievable — every time I see ube, I’m buying it,” said Pagdanganan, 70, a Bay Shore resident who immigrated with her husband in 1979. “I want to try to see how much it maintains the way I grew up with ube in the Philippines.”

For the diaspora of the Philippines, who come from a nation with more than 7,000 islands and an estimated 150 languages and dialects, ube is a common bond.

“We yearn for ube, whatever form of ube we can find,” Pagdanganan said.

A versatile vegetable

Ube, pronounced "OO-beh,"  has been traditionally used in Philippine desserts and snacks.

 The root vegetable can be made into a paste or jam used in pastries, cookies, cakes, bread, candy and ice cream.  It can also be boiled and served as a savory dish to be dipped in fish sauce or fermented shrimp paste.

Among the most popular desserts is halaya, a pudding made from the mashed yam and cooked with condensed milk, butter and sugar. It can be eaten by itself, used as a pastry filling or spread on bread.

Ube is associated with good times, because it’s a staple of holidays and special occasions, Filipino Long Islanders said.

The most mentioned is halo-halo, a shaved ice dessert that features ube ice cream atop an assortment of sweets that may include jellies, fruits, mung beans, condensed milk and flan.

A sign of ube's mainstream appeal came last month when Filipino immigrants and foodies gathered in Manhattan for Ubeland, a festival that started about two years ago and is held at least twice a year across New York City. Lines formed beneath purple tents for paella, tiramisu, doughnuts, drinks and other creative takes on the purple vegetable.

“It’s weird looking . . . but you turn it into something beautiful,” said chef Joy Ann Salanga, 37, who owns Kusinera in East Meadow. “That’s what I fell in love with, the art of it. The possibilities are endless.”

East meets West

Low pressure introductions help ube gain acceptance at Kusinera, which means “female chef” in the Philippine language of Tagalog.

Salanga sometimes offers traditional ube desserts for her customers to try for free. She also concocts her own East-West desserts as introductions to the purple yam. Ube is in her cheesecake, churros, cookies, flan, slushies and cinnamon buns.

“I want people to eat ube, but they don’t know what ube halaya is,” Salanga said. “How do you eat it and how do you appreciate it? I took on regular, everyday foods, everyday desserts and just elevated them, incorporating ube as a flavor.”

A table of eight unanimously agreed on the deliciousness as the chef plied them with ube-infused desserts.

The purple ice cream was one of the first bites that East Meadow diner Jayde Miranda, 4, took from a dessert glass of halo-halo. “It’s good,” she declared.

In Montauk, the summertime Ditch Witch food truck introduced ube to beachgoers four years ago when business co-owner Grant Monahan and his wife had son Koda.

They wanted something to represent their child, with Irish and Filipino roots, so they put pulled pork between ube buns. It was a hit.

Then last summer, they baked cookies with ube, matcha and regular dough. Those multicolor cookies were a hit too, Monahan said: “It’s such a beautiful, vibrant purple that it catches people’s eyes. . . . There were people that would come up before the cookies were ready and they would pre-buy them.”

A taste of home

The taste of ube can evoke strong memories, Filipino Long Islanders said.

Salanga remembers the university medical missions when she was a nursing student. The teams served the indigenous population in the mountains of Calumpang, where ube grew wild in abundance and as a farmed crop. The locals would fashion machete-style tools from branches, spare metal and whatever was around to dig up and cut the root vegetables.

Their patients had little money, so they piled ube into baskets that Salanga and others carried down the mountain paths to their van.

“It goes beyond payment,” she said. “It’s their gesture saying, ‘This is all I have, but I’m going to give it to you.’ ”

Like people from many cultures, Filipinos prize their foods but some say they take it a step further.  There’s even a word for worrying about not having enough food during a party or feast — “kurilyo” — so Filipinos bring more than needed.

This culture of food sharing partly explains why Anna Corre, 42, a Garden City physical therapist, has not had to pay for jars of ube jam that she asks family and friends to bring back from visits to the Good Shepherd Convent in Baguio City in the Philippines. The convent is known for its ube and strawberries, and during her childhood, her family visited the area regularly, especially to escape the heat.

It’s not easy to find fresh ube in the States, Filipino Long Islanders said. Despite the rise in popularity, the vegetable is rarely found in Asian supermarkets here due to the expense of exporting it, they said.

“Authenticity” in ube desserts is  a big reason Corre lives in the New York metro region, she said. For parties and holidays, she can get cakes in Queens at Red Ribbon Bakeshop in Woodside, known as New York’s Little Manila. The bakery is an international chain that started in the Philippines and has sold ube desserts in Woodside for decades, sourcing its mashed ube, the jam and even ube bits from the island nation.

“It’s always a hunt to find one that really tastes like home,” Corre said of ube desserts. “It’s very celebratory when we have it.”

Remembering their roots

As the purple yam gains popularity outside the Philippines, some concerns are on the radar for Filipino New Yorkers as they hear word from home, see news reports on the ube economy and worry about farmers' ability to keep up with demand for the slow-growing yam. 

They say products marketed as ube might be another type of purple yam or sweet potatoes grown in other countries or it may be artificial flavoring, with vanilla, sugar or coconut.

“I am so scared to try them because I know I will be disappointed,” said Jill Espinoza, 41, of Oakland Gardens in Queens, a flight attendant who started an ube baking business, Jillycious, during the pandemic.

Also, several Filipino New Yorkers said farmers in the Philippines have not grown rich in the ube trend, their harvests underpriced by bulk buyers, who sell to major food producers, who sell to major retailers.

On social media, Julie Palanca (@Joulesgems), AKA the “Ube Queen,” publicizes where she’s found authentic ube desserts on Long Island and New York City and also questions whether the Philippines’ ube supply can sustain the trend.

“The farmers lose out because they end up selling everything, including the tuber seeds, so they can’t even restart their crop or it takes them a long time,” said Palanca, 32, a Brooklyn schoolteacher. 

“It’s really close to my heart and I hope people learn about it and they know that it comes from the Filipino culture.”

For now, Salanga said, her fellow Filipinos have relished the exposure of a root vegetable that’s as synonymous with her culture as kimchi is to Korea, matcha to Japan and sausages to Italy.

“If you go to a crowd and you’re not sure if that Asian person is Filipino, just yell ube,” the chef said.

“As a proud Filipino, I want to share . . . one small thing the Philippines can contribute to the culinary industry. I just want people to understand that ube is more than just a trendy, purple ingredient.”